bluebruce

I can picture Mercer's reign as chairman/CEO now... Season 1: 'Expects' top 8 finish. Expects us to win every week. Fires the manager before Christmas when we sit in 10th, deciding he doesn't have what it takes. Hires someone else, continuing to expect them to win every week. After an initial honeymoon period where the new man does well as all new managers do, Mercer treats everybody to a pint or a bottle of vino, whichever they prefer. Chaddy is invited to the club's Christmas shindig but refuses. Players get drunk too often - Dack gets especially drunk on a few occasions, leading to some unsavoury masturbatory incidents in dark corners (causing groin injuries) and far-too-nimble photo opportunities in back gardens. He breaks his knee during one of these. We slip to 15th by the end of the season. Manager is fired. Mercer has used the club's finances to bet on us to win every match, leaving a huge financial black hole. Season 2: Mercer finds our saviour and guarantor of Premiership football. Thank the good Lord, COYLE-Y is back in town! Promotion is the aim (and 'Coyle-y' has a proven track record of promotion - his one promotion trumps Mowbray's two, because Mercerman), and the team are expected to win every week. No youth players are to be signed if they can't go straight into the team, so no youth players are signed. Coyle-y plumps for a few ex-footballers from the local old folks home on wages of £20,000 per week. A few hundred Rovers fans die throughout the season from a combination of suicides and being irritated to death by Coyle-y's post-defeat pressers. With our free-flowing attacking football, we are relegated by far more than goal difference, far earlier than the last game of the season. Betting on us winning every week has completely crippled the club, who now sit in £300 million of debt. Mercer is given a pay-rise by Venkys. Coyle-y is given a pay-rise by Mercer.

Why? He perfectly fit the bill of the challenge that was set. He was dog shite and hopefully Brereton isn't, but nothing was said about them going on to be a success. I think the original poster's point was only about allocation of resources for a 'project'.

The same occurred to me. Switch one of our CMs out for him, put 2 up top. Admittedly would have left us open to a counter so Tony took the cautious option again.

Jordan Slew. 1.1 million, 7 years ago at that, hadn't even played at all until December when he came on as a sub in the 89th minute. Never played for us in the league again. Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain cost 12 million rising to 15 million and didn't get a league start until January. I think there are actually a lot of examples in the Prem. The big clubs do it all the time. Some of the lesser lights do too sometimes, especially with the money now I bet. A million isn't that much now. It has probably happened in the Championship too but I don't know enough to go looking. However, what I'm absolutely sure hasn't happened is the same thing, in this league, for this money. I'd be amazed if it has ever happened in this league for more than say, 3 million tops, if that. What we have done is bizarrely unique and I hope Ben starts to start soon and maybe we can stop talking about it.

What? You won't agree to disagree? You are refusing to let him disagree with you? Bit forceful Chaddy.

So in our last games, we've conceded, in order: 4, 3, 2, 1... Does a clean sheet beckon against Birmingham? If it does, I hope we don't then repeat the cycle.

They had quite a few chances they could have scored from. The game could have gone either way in the end, which only makes it more disappointing really. Credit to Boro though, they did come out fired up for that second half. We should have been able to finish the game off though for sure.

No, that wouldn't have been my opinion. I rated Mahoney highly. Yes, barely worth mentioning, like Platt. Tomlinson and Hardcastle are worth mentioning, because they've seemed like they could have been on the cusp at times, but neither really featured with the first team close to as much as Mahoney did. What you're forgetting with your stats is that Mahoney featured 14 times in the season we went down, mostly under Mowbray, in a higher league than the one we dropped to, aged nearly 2 years younger than he is now. I feel TM can be too cautious with his youth, but it really seemed to me he did rate Mahoney enough that he would have become a regular last year and into this season. At the club he purports to support.

All it shows is that he has played more games than some fringe players, some of whom are barely worth mentioning and some of whom are younger. Mahoney appeared to be on the cusp of truly breaking through here. I think he'd have played a lot of games last season. We will never know because he has gone to a Premier League club to live the loanly life.

Can't get more? They seem rather popular.

No of course they're not. Not what I said either. Yes both of those forced a move. Especially Shearer, we were desperate to keep him. Not calling him a mercenary. But he forced a move, and probably the wrong one. I also don't consider him a proper Rovers fan to do so. But he's a professional footballer and can do what he likes, as they all do. Give over, Nuttall's career was completely in the shitter when we got him.

I feel uncomfortable seeing 'stroke' and Dack in the same sentence. But as long as I don't see them in the same room/dark corner.

I take it you're having a colonoscopy then. I'm not, but for 10 million, I can be. Take note, streaming giants!

Mahoney did force a move. He was offered a contract, he refused it. We didn't want him to go, and he did.

Not trying to say I'm a better fan pal, just a different focus. You're probably a 'better' fan as you'll be going and I won't.

I don't really care how nice of a day out it is. Only the overall progression and success of the football club.

One thing is for sure...it's gonna be a looooong January.

Have to say, although I probably won't be buying one, that's a terrific design. Props to this Jen lady. Hopefully he appreciates it and it helps us nab him permanently!

Why's that? I think it's a terrible draw personally. Highly likely we will lose. 'Best' case scenario is a replay congesting our January schedule, which is right after a very busy December. Think we are more likely to put the backups in and get spanked, have it over and done with. I like having an easy home fixture in the third round, and fourth round, so we can go on a bit of a run and afford to test out the fringe players without it being certain suicide. We have quite a few players that don't get enough game time but could go on a fair cup run if the games aren't too taxing. TM might hate the Barcodes though, given his upbringing, and go all out.

And an assist.

I don't feel it was a completely failed experiment. At first, it went great. Didn't he score in every kind of 'debut' he had? EFL Trophy as a sub, scored. League as a sub, scored. FA Cup as a sub, scored. I agree with Stuart, from what I recall he just got dropped prematurely when he was on fire (his all-round game wasn't quite up to scratch but he was a kid getting used to it, and still notching). He then got used sparingly and lost his momentum. I do think one of Tony's flaws is not playing in-form players at times. For me, when someone is playing hot, you've got to put them in and let the shirt be theirs to lose to someone playing hotter. And I don't care how they look in training or (to an extent) what the opposition lineup is. I think he also stopped being in the U-23 teams didn't he? Which would only have helped him lose his form and match sharpness.

I would generally expect one of them. Or being a beast in the air. Mostly I'd expect them to have been able to put the ball in the net at a reasonable rate. A mix of these traits to a good level, but not necessarily 'exceptional' at any of them, is acceptable though. Of course, I'll also make some allowances when they're 19. Not that spending £7 million on potential in our position is what I would have done. If I did, I'd expect whoever I bought to have started a league game by now...

Didn't we technically already do that? Davenport reportedly turned down a new deal with City this summer and signed for us. Granted, if they wanted to keep him badly enough we couldn't have stopped it, and they valued Dav at about 500k not 8 million so it's a bit different, but Pep was meant to rate him. Shame he has been constantly crocked.

Steady on with the 'you lot', only one bloke said that. Even the OP admitted it was unrealistic.

Don't be so negative. I see absolutely no reason why we can't sign one of the best centre halves in the world next summer...